'We won 3-2!' - Jose Mourinho claims 'great victory' for Benfica despite 2-2 draw with Braga in extraordinary sarcastic rant after seeing 'clear goal' ruled out

Benfica and Braga drew 2-2 on Sunday evening but Mourinho was left fuming after some controversial refereeing. First, with his side leading 1-0, a penalty was awarded for handball, from which Braga equalised before, at 2-2, their potential winner was ruled out for a soft foul. After a cross was blocked, seemingly by a Braga hand, the ball fell to defender Vitor Carvalho, who attempted to clear. Richard Rios closed him down and after a shoulder barge, won the ball back, before squaring to Samuel Dahl, who finished. The referee, inexplicably, blew for a foul, and VAR agreed. Braga did have a man sent off for two yellow cards before full-time, but that did nothing to assuage Mourinho's fury.

Mourinho is no stranger to taking aim at referees, and he chose to do so this time via the medium of sarcasm.

He told reporters: "Without humor, I congratulate SC Braga on many things. I congratulate the president, because I returned many years later and seeing this training center is fantastic. Congratulations to the team, which is good, to the coach who is building a great team, and even to the fans who create a great atmosphere. As for the game, I think it's a great victory for us. A great first half, in which we conceded two goals, due to two of our own mistakes. In the second half we were very strong, we completely dominated the game, we scored two goals, and winning the game in Braga is very difficult; after being down, winning was very complicated."

Corrected on the scoreline by a journalist, he replied: "We won 3-2! That's the football we have, I just do the best I can in my job and dedicate myself as much as I can. I'm not entirely happy with myself because I couldn't do what I wanted for 90 minutes. But we won 3-2, you know I'm speaking ironically, otherwise I would be severely penalised. 

"The club as an institution may or may not do something, possibly following the path we're getting used to and accustomed to. I just train and make the assessment. The fact that we played against SC Braga in a short time means I don't want to go into great tactical analysis. To dissect why they were better in the first half and why we were able to be superior in the second. Good game and good referee, he officiated a positive match, but games and points are decided by these kinds of decisions, and that's what happened."

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Mourinho was particularly unhappy with the fact that VAR backed the referee's initial on-field decision. 

He added: "Obviously. We scored three clean goals. I repeat, I liked the refereeing, one or two yellow cards, one or two strange criteria, and one or two balls with the game stopped, negating the advantage for the team that wanted to come out. A difficult game to referee, with a good pace, honestly I liked it. 

"When it came time to make the mistake that decided the game, it was witnessed by the gentleman who was in the VAR room. These strange things happen, where there are clubs that win many games with mistakes and others that lose many points with mistakes. There's a long trip ahead and I wanted to leave here with the joy and conviction, even if they call me crazy, that we turned the game around."

Mourinho will next have a chance to assess the Portuguese league's refereeing quality when Benfica play Estoril on Saturday. Benfica are currently third in the league table, having won 10 and drawn six of their 16 games thus far; while they are unbeaten, they are 10 points behind leaders Porto, who have won 15 and drawn one of their 16 games.